So sure of your reality
by Fanny Tompkins
Summary: Arthur recruits Ariadne back into his new team of Extractors. However, when another team is looking for a guide into Limbo for a job, the young architects is their first choice for the job, whether she wants to do it or not.
1. Arthur!

So, I make no promises on update times as I have very little but this has been kicking around my brain and must come out - sooner or later.

Rated T for possible future A/A situations and future violence.

Disclaimer: I do not own anything about Inception except a new-found obsession for both it and Chris Nolan!

1.

Ariadne spent absolutely no time in Los Angeles. She breezed through customs with her carry-on case and headed right to the nearest airline counter and booked the next available flight back to Paris. After a quick spot wash and change in the airport bathroom, she had just enough time to grab a cup of coffee, smutty magazine (Brad and Angelina were on the rocks again! Each was taking 3 kids in the divorce!) and climb right back onboard a 737, coach class, bound for home.

Ten hours back. Ten hours of dissection and re-playing what had happened over and over and over yet again. Ten hours of wondering what had happened to the others on each level. And ten hours of tipping her bishop over. Checking she still had a firm hold on reality.

By the time the plane landed at Charles du Gaulle at 9 am, Ariadne realized that she probably wouldn't experience any jet-lag as she hadn't really had adjust to any time difference. She took a taxi home and walked into her apartment. Everything was just how she had left it, what was it? Two days ago? Could it only be two days? She sat on her couch and tipped her bishop again. How drastically her life had changed over these past two days. She had been so much more than an architect in the end. So much more...

She woke up the next morning, tipped her bishop and then got dressed for school. She slipped back into her old routine. Everything on the outside appeared normal. She attended class, she handed in projects. However, her bishop was always with her. Mal's words rang in her head. "So sure of your reality". That would send her scrambling for her bishop, tipping it in desperate haste. "This is reality, this is reality" Like a mantra.

Three months later, Ariadne sat on her couch again. Sleep deprived after pulling an all-nighter to get her final term assignment in. It was good, really good. She was positive she would receive high marks, but it just didn't seem so important anymore. However it was all she had left, her only creative outlet left.

There was a knock at her door. Ariadne frowned, wondering why there had been no phone call to ask for permission for entry into the lobby. She considered ignoring it. She wasn't expecting anyone and they'd go away if it were a salesperson. There was another knock. Again ignored. A third knock.

Ariadne, now curious, double-checked the chain guard was on and then pulled to door open.

"Arthur!"


	2. I don't really know him  her

A/N: Thanks for the reviews! Now I know why people are so happy for them and I am resolved to leave more myself. Some asked for the plot to be better revealed – which I agree totally with – but totally eluded me in this chapter! Sorry! I promise the next installment will be all plot all the time!

2.

They were sitting in a café around the corner from her apartment. Ariadne had a Tazo chai latté with soy; Arthur had a coffee. She laughed out loud when she registered their drink choices – it just seemed so representative of their personalities. Aridne with her levels of dreams, hidden paradox's and layers of detailing; it also took some time to make and held more calories than what was reasonable good for you in a hot drink. Arthur's coffee was black, straightforward, and functional yet smelled heavenly and probably tasted exquisite.

Arthur's eye's crinkled slightly at her.

"What's the joke?"

She just nodded him off.

"Nothing."

Sipping her latté, she started to mentally catalogue her surroundings. A trick she'd picked up during the Fischer case and had yet to be able to break. She noticed the pitting of the metal table, the grain of the pavement, the way the paint sat thickly on it, designating the bicycle lane. She noticed the weave of Arthur's suite, the sheen of the dying sun on the material and finally the texture of his skin as he reached out and touched her hand.

"Ariadne?"

She shook her head and smiled up at him ruefully.

"Sorry. I was up all night finishing an assignment and seem to be on auto-zombie. You now have my complete and utter attention span." She sipped her latté again. "Although I can't guarantee the length of it." The corner of her mouth quirked in amusement at her own truth as she pushed her mug aside and focused completely on him.

Arthur's heart hitched slightly. He had forgotten the effect of the architect's full attention directed at him. Or maybe he thought that time had dispersed it. He's thought about her constantly over the last three month. He'd looked for her at the airport, at first with a practiced air of nonchalance and then with a budding feeling of anxiety when he couldn't find her. She'd seemed fine on the shores of the last dream level but he had just wanted to hear that she was going to be fine too, not just Cobb. Eames was the one (of course) who tracked down her itinerary and confirmed her return trip. It was Eames and Yusuf combined who convinced him to give her time and space to recover. Charging after her for debriefing would more than likely cause more harm than good. Miles agreed to contact one of them if she showed any symptoms of … well being different, when he returned a week after her. Miles had never called. He had always admired that quiet, almost stealthy band of steel that ran right through the core of who she was.

"Arthur?"

Now it was his turn to shake his head.

"I apologize. It would appear that I am suffering from a particularly bad bout of jet-lag."

Ariadne grinned. "Well, this conversation is going to prove to be really interesting…or really not."

"Let's strive for interesting." Arthur leaned in and lowered his voice. "Ariadne, I need an architect again."

Working to keep her face neutral, Ariadne clasped her hands together under the table in attempt to control them. She didn't want Arthur to see them shaking. She didn't want them to reach out and cup his face, like they were madly willing to do.

"I see". Yet unable to release her hands (they were still willfully focused on Arthur's face) and therefore unable to reach out for her latté, Ariadne begin to catalogue her surroundings again. Something that always calmed her. How the gum was stuck to the sidewalk, how the lamp globe was covered in swirled grime, how shiny the grain of Arthur's shoes were against the chipping layers paint of his chair.

"You don't have to decide this instant." Concern creased Arthur's brow. She seemed…disconnected somehow. Her normal responses seemed tamped down. Although, he ruefully reminded himself, it's not like he knew her that well. A mental reminder that always irritated him and at the same time, made him a little fearful that his impressions of her (he held dear to him) would turn out to be somehow false.

"Are you still at the warehouse?" Her eyes were on his again and he felt a slow burn in his chest.

"I will be. I've not gone back yet but I still hold the lease. I'll be there tomorrow."

She was, in truth, a little relieved that he hadn't been kicking around Paris for a few days before coming to see her. Not that it should matter, it's not like she should top his list of things to do in Paris, but still, she was glad he'd come to her first.

Trusting her hands not to betray her, she lifted her mug to her lips and drained it.

"Then I will see you tomorrow." She hesitated. "Arthur. This time I would like to know the details of the case up front. I…don't think I want to…" She corrected herself quickly, "I don't think I can work on just anything." She frowned, wondering if that sounded snobbish. She sighed and tried again. "I mean, I think my work may be affected…negatively…if I couldn't reconcile the job with my…moral compass." She cringed at her own choice of words and sighed again. "Is that okay? Is that okay to ask? Is that considered…against some sort Extractor code of proper behaviour?"

"That is a perfectly fine thing to ask Ariadne. Dom and I always discussed a case before we took it and anyone else we worked with could always walk away from that decision. "

"Shiny." She stood up. "I'll see you tomorrow."

Arthur stood up fluidly as well. "I'll see you tomorrow."

As she walked away, she heard his chair scrape as he sat back down. Smiling to herself, she allowed herself the luxury of thoroughly enjoying that aspect of him. Always the gentleman. Always? She pondered the thought for a moment, her tired brain allowing her to indulge in the one fantasy she kept locked up tight. The one where Arthur's was not longer a gentleman. The one where he bent her over the nearest surface, hands on her everywhere, lips on her everywhere….!

Whoa! She was going to have to clamp down on that one pretty hard if they were going to be working together. After all, she didn't really know him. Not really. She pushed the fantasy into her mental vault, locked it up and tucked away the key.

That night, she slept dreamlessly.


End file.
